Slow Burn Slate Podcasts

Hosted by Joel Anderson. Coming in May 2023.
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In 1970, 22-year-old Shirley Wheeler got an illegal abortion in Florida. When she refused to tell the police who performed the procedure, she was arrested and charged with manslaughter. In the months that followed, she’d be prosecuted and publicly condemned. She’d also become the unlikely face of the fight for reproductive rights.
Season 7 of Slow Burn is produced by Susan Matthews, Samira Tazari, Sophie Summergrad, and Sol Werthan.
Derek John is Sr. Supervising Producer of Narrative Podcasts.
Editorial direction by Josh Levin, Derek John and Johanna Zorn. Mixing by Merritt Jacob and Kevin Bendis.
Our theme music is composed by Alexis Cuadrado. Artwork by Derreck Johnson based on a photo provided by Robert Wheeler.
The season’s reporting was supported by a grant from the International Women’s Media Foundation’s Howard G. Buffett Fund for Women Journalists.
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In this member-exclusive episode, Slow Burn’s host Susan Matthews and producer Samira Tazari discuss what to expect this season, and what it was like to interview people in Shirley Wheeler’s life for Episode 1. Then, Matthews interviews TV historian Stephen Bowie about the TV drama The Defenders, which aired a surprisingly progressive take on abortion rights in 1962 that scared off the show’s regular advertisers and some network stations.

Production by Chau Tu.

In this Apple Podcasts Show of the Year Extra, we tell one of our favorite stories that we didn’t have room for in the original series. It’s about Ron Sachs, a college newspaper editor in Florida who decided to publish a list of abortion providers in his paper even after he was told that doing so was illegal. Ron was arrested around the same time as fellow Florida resident Shirley Wheeler. What happened next would eventually help change Florida’s abortion laws.

To hear all of our Show of the Year Extras visit https://apple.co/showoftheyear2022

Jack and Barbara Willke got their start on the Catholic speaking circuit talking about the pleasure of sex within marriage. Their daughter would convince them to shift their focus to another hot-button issue. The Willkes’ Handbook on Abortion, and the photographs they distributed along with it, would help kickstart the right-to-life movement.
To see the cover of the Handbook on Abortion, some of the photos the Willkes used, and the brochure “Life or Death,” go to slate.com/handbook
Season 7 of Slow Burn is produced by Susan Matthews, Samira Tazari, Sophie Summergrad, and Sol Werthan.
Derek John is Sr. Supervising Producer of Narrative Podcasts.
Editorial direction by Josh Levin, Derek John and Johanna Zorn. Merritt Jacob is our Technical Director.
Our theme music is composed by Alexis Cuadrado. Artwork by Derreck Johnson based on a photo provided by Robert Wheeler.
The season’s reporting was supported by a grant from the International Women’s Media Foundation’s Howard G. Buffett Fund for Women Journalists.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this member-exclusive episode, Slow Burn’s host Susan Matthews and associate producer Sophie Summergrad discuss researching the pro-life movement for Episode 2. Then, Matthews interviews Jennifer L. Holland, an assistant professor of U.S. history at the University of Oklahoma, about what happened with the anti-abortion movement since Roe v. Wade was decided, and how it became so intense and, at times, violent.

Production by Cleo Levin and Chau Tu.